


Music & Rain

by Kosei



Category: Rockman | Mega Man Classic
Genre: 2 oneshots, Alternate Universe - High School, M/M, Music, One Shot, Rain, idk - Freeform, theres not much to say, wrote these two for BassRock week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:27:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24263596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kosei/pseuds/Kosei
Summary: Music- The open chords to a guitar are C, E, E Minor, G, A, A minor, B, F, D.Rain- Based on the first fic in the BassRock tag (on ao3). It's raining, just like that day.
Relationships: Forte | Bass/Rockman | Mega Man
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	1. Music

“What the hell are you doing in here?”

Rock blinked at the unexpected tone of voice, almost hateful. Then again, he expected the classroom to be empty. It was the music room, Tempo and Blues were off doing errands for the teacher, and as far as he knew he was the only other one interested in a music club.  
Although Rock was not much of a musical artist. No, he was holding a recorder, almost embarrassingly behind his back. It was embarrassing, he wasn’t a little kid, yet it was the only thing he had experience with… even if it was only playing “hot cross buns.”

He slid the door open, and blinked in surprise, frozen in the doorway.

“Bass…? What are you doing here?”

The one in question gave him a nasty glare, ruffling his hair a bit, as Bass shifted from where he sat on top of a desk, perched in the middle of the room.

“I’m trying to join the fucking music club, what does it look like? What are you doing here? Tch. I swear if you’re the one who’s running this-”

“E-er you don’t need to worry about that!’ he tried calming him down, mostly so he wouldn’t hit him. Which, by the look in his eyes, Bass was close to doing so.

“Blues runs the club. So um, he’s the president.”

“What?!” he suddenly snapped up to his feet, instead of on the desk pushed to the wall, and slung a guitar case over his shoulder. For a moment his shaggy hair swept back, revealing feather earrings. The messy platinum-blonde hair usually covered his ears, so it was no wonder he got away with breaking the dress code.  
The dress code was pretty stupid anyway.

“I can’t stand him. Almost as much as I can’t stand you. He’s so fucking hoity-toity and thinks he knows everything. “

“Blues doesn’t act like that…?” Rock was perplexed by what he was talking about. Blues was the silent wolf type, the kind that sat in his room all day and would walk with you in silence. But the way he was being described you'd assume he was the know-it-all teachers' pet.

“He sure fucking does in music, let me tell ya- he was lecturing someone about how 'Bossa nova is an underrated genre' or whatever bullshit. I don’t want to be in a club with someone who’s going to stifle my style and tell me how to play.” He jabbed a thumb to his chest, pointing at himself, his red eyes narrowed and lips curled. “I play for me!”

“I didn’t know you played guitar.”

That made him scoff. “Of course you wouldn’t notice, you’re a space case-” his eyes caught sight of what Rock had in his hand-. “Is that a _fucking recorder_?”

Rock blushed and hid it behind his back. “I’m just using it to practice! I don’t like playing with it.” he hated the sound, and it drove Roll, plus his dog rush insane. “I-I just-”

“Next you’ll be playing the ukulele.”

Rock supposed that was an insult, by Bass' tone of voice, but in his opinion, the ukulele was a perfectly respectable instrument. What could be wrong about it? 

“Well, maybe… I don’t know if I could play the guitar, the sheet music looks complicated.”

Bass rolled his eyes. “If you’re expecting to learn by playing sheet music, you don’t know shit about music.”

“I’m here because I want to learn more!” Rock exclaimed, frustrated, and finally entered the room, shutting the door behind him. “You said Blues was a total know-it-all when it came to music, but that is exactly how you are acting right now!” He continued as Bass flinched in annoyance, “You shouldn’t put people down for wanting to know more about the things they're interested in.”

“...” Bass looked away. “If I drive you away from it, that just means you were never serious about it, to begin with."

He sighed, the argument wasn’t worth it. “What guitar do you play? I know there are different types.”

“I play the bass, duh.”

Of course. Rock was surprised he answered his question, perhaps he was distracted by something.

“Isn’t this the part where you threaten me into leaving?”

“No, because I’m still joining.”

“Didn’t you just say-”

“That would mean the asshole won. And I never lose.” He crossed his arms and leaned back against the wall.

Why was he so frustrating?! Still… he knew more about music… “In that case, do you have any suggestions of an instrument to pick up?”

“Fuck if I know. Try the baby glockenspiel in the corner.”

“What’s a glockenspiel?”

“Xylophone.” He threw his arms up. “Jeez.”

Rock almost said he didn’t know what that was either but kept his mouth shut. His vacant stare gave him away though, as Bass looked deeply annoyed and growled at him, “Fuckin’ hell, why are you bothering to join a music club if you don’t know what a xylophone is?”

“Quit making me feel bad!”

“You’re so fucking annoying, how about you bother your sister about this, doesn’t she know how to play the drums?”

“How do you know that?”

“Your fucking brother, duh.”

“....Right… Would you teach me how to play bass then? 

He scoffed, “Fuck no.”

“Why not? You know so much about it…”

“You’re acting like a little fuckin’ smart ass you know that?”

“Well-”

“Playing the bass is hard for a newbie. You should start with a normal guitar like acoustic.” He thumbed over in the direction of a guitar in the corner of the room.

“I thought you hated me.”

“I do, I want to see how badly you will fail at this, duh.”

Rock rolled his eyes, but he grabbed the guitar anyways.

“Jesus!” Bass snapped at him. “Do you not have any fucking idea how to hold that?! You’re going to break the strings!”

He blinked and looked at how he was holding it, he didn’t think it was bad but-

“Just grab it by one hand on the neck! God, I’m seriously going to have to teach you how t’ fucking hold it…”

Rock sighed and walked over. Bass slumped on the floor, and Rock sat across from him.

“Right, just hold it in your lap, balanced, one arm on the strings, one on the neck. Easy.”

Rock nodded and followed his directions. He didn’t like how Bass was getting huffy at him, but also felt… happy he was bothering to help him. It was unusual for Bass. He didn’t like Rock because of- reasons that were beyond him, he felt the need to prove that he was better than him. Rock felt that he would never understand why. But he did believe Bass wanted to see him struggle. So that was plausible enough.

Bass cleared his throat. “Alright, since you’re a newbie you’ll be learning the open chords first."

“Open what?”

“Chords. How you play the notes, duh.” He rolled his eyes again. “They’re E, E Minor, C, G, D, A, A Minor, and I guess if you want to, F, and if you hate yourself, B.”

“Hate yourself?”

“B’s a bitch to play for beginners. These are the beginning chords ‘cause they sound nicest, but they are also overused to fucking hell. I tell you what- your stupid ass brother is right about these being zombie chords. So many different ways to play a note and everyone does the same shit, makes me fuckin’ sick.”

“...” Rock let his silence speak for himself.

“Here's some things you need to know before I teach you shit about guitar.” He cleared his throat. “There are six strings, right? And there’s the basic way to play a note right? Like for C, you’d pick C-E-G. And then C and E again. But you can drop a couple of the notes, for just the root note, like E since it’s the third on the line on the sheet.”

Rock stared for a long time, “I-”

“I’m fucking up here I know, Jesus, okay…” He blew out a breath. “You got the open chords right?”

“Yep, A, A Minor, E, E Minor, G, F, and B.”

“You forgot D, but I’m surprised you remembered any.”

“So um, how do you play it?” Rock asked next. 

“Your fingers are too straight, curve them out first.”

“Fine…” he tried, and Bass got pissy with him, again.

“No like this!”

His breath caught in his throat as he grasped his hand, fixing his fingers for him. He wondered why his heart leaped, and he figured it was because Bass never touched him unless it was a punch. 

“Now play with the tips of your fingers.”

Rock nodded mutely. 

“C is that one.”

A note, a string plucked, a sweet tune rang out in the otherwise silent room.

“Not bad. That one is E.”

Again the sweet tune rang through the room.

“G.”

Again.

“C again.”

Again.

“E again.”

“Try playing it again.”

His head swam with the amount of against in his head, and Rock swallowed, nervous about hearing him getting angry again when he sounded somewhat impressed. He played C-E-G-C-E, and it sounded like a blissfully complete note. Rock’s heart fluttered with pride and could catch the hint of a smile on Bass’ face. His chest fluttered again, and his face grew hot.

It was at that moment Blues decided to enter the room. His shades didn’t hide the amused expression on his face. Beside him was Tempo, carrying a keyboard under her arm, eyebrows raised as she looked at them with a cool expression. 

Bass stood up, and crossed his arms. Scowling, he said, “Took you fucking long enough.’

“...What are you doing here?”

“I’m here to join your stupid club, duh.”

Blues shut the door and Tempo set up her keyboard, standing it behind it, and artfully tested a key. 

“...Hm.” Blues smiled slightly and turned to Tempo. “That makes it easier then. We have all the required members. “

She sighed, “Thank goodness for that. I was beginning to worry.”

“Although…” he rubbed his chin, smirking, “it is curious how he appeared to be getting along so-”

“Shut up!”

Was it always that way? For some reason… Bass… For a moment… looked sort of cute when he smiled…  
He wished to see it again.


	2. Rain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You should read the first fic in the BassRock tag. It's good.

Treble was splayed on his lap, slightly whining as he stroked his head. Bass shook with the raindrops seeping through the leaves and dripped onto his head, hatefulness in his expression. It washed away with the stupid rain, begging him to calm and feel at ease or with “nature” or whatever bullshit. 

Nature is outside of his league. He is completely artificial, not even the material he is made of was part of nature. It was manufactured and produced in a lab under the slimy fingers of Wily. Nothing of his was natural, from the copper wires wrapped in rubber, the core in his chest that relaxed into a slow rhythm. Bass had never looked into his chest, never seen what he was made of. He was usually knocked cold, never awake for maintenance or repairs. 

Usually, it wasn’t by choice. One time he was placed in a stasis chamber for upgrades. It lasted for over a month. And he awoke, not by Wily’s choice. With a strong punch, the glass shattered, shards sputtering across the floor, cracking under his boot, almost upset at their misfortune. 

His mission was to destroy Megaman. Even though all the different times where Wily has tried to replace him, that was still engrained into his coding. Defeating Megaman is who he is. Wily never learns, however, and his attempts have not ceased. He’s seen the red bot Wily’s been making in the lab, sneaking inside when Wily was asleep. It was half complete, maybe even less than half. The core in its chest small and fragile, the synthetic fibers for hair only threaded through its scalp on one side of the things head. It was disgusting, Bass didn’t know anything about this thing his creator made, but Wily was going all out. That hardware was built way more complex than him. He thinks. More like, what humans called a “gut feeling.”

He could have torn it apart but…

Bass kicked at a puddle, the water splashing noisily, rippling where drops of rain fell. 

Sometimes he wondered what the point was. He wasn’t stupid, maybe a little… What’s the word? Impulsive? But he thought he was smart enough. His coding was sophisticated enough. Unlike most robot masters, he didn’t eat the shit Wily shoveled to them. Sure, Wily laments that it’s his “programming”, but he knew the truth. He could see right through the bullshit. Wily was just a lonely prick who loved robots more than people and was envious of Dr. Light. Truly, the way he obsessed over him made Bass think of a lovers spat. 

Maybe he should tell him that. It would be well worth it just to see his reaction. 

But as of late, he’s been… Thinking. He’s felt (and probably sounded) all depressed and mopey like Megaman does when he begs him not to battle. He hates that. He hates his big blue eyes, eerily human-like. 

Bass hates to admit this, but one time linked up to him, confronting him, armorless so Light or his sister couldn’t listen in… 

He didn’t know what the fuck he was thinking, he almost felt bad about it. Invading someone’s motherboard like that wouldn’t give him the answers he wanted: how the fuck Megaman kept destroying him in battle?

The rain went ignored that day, for their cores beat and hummed in tandem. He had struck into the core, the root of who Rock was, cried out his name as he felt back, peeled the layers of code. Only to disconnect once a packet exploded in his face, electric shocks coursed through their bodies. 

Something changed that day, and he hated the fact that Rock- MEGAMAN- treated him even kinder. He wasn’t weak like him, he didn’t need his sympathy. He didn’t need anything from him, and the fact that Rock was so sweet made Bass want to despise him more.

At the same time, that day he managed to… understand him? If that made any sense to anyone, it wasn’t him. But Rock wasn’t an anomaly, a puzzle to figure out. Somehow his movements clicked, and his focused stares like a secret message.

He hated that but liked it as well. He didn't do well with complicated feelings. The hate was understandable. A person fucking pissed you off, so you hated their guts and wanted to rip them apart. Simple. But when your systems, the very purpose of your being told you to hate a person, but then- time seems to stop. And you’re in awe. This person… They get you. Data and code aren’t tangible, you can't hold zeros and ones in your hand. They exist on an entirely different plane. And for a moment they'd shared that. That plane. He was wracked from head to toe as the code came undone and he remembers, vaguely, gripping Rock's body tightly to his as they both cried. 

If he had a choice, however, he would have never done it. It was too late. As a big of a fucking moronic move it was, he knew he couldn’t undo it. Time travel still had yet to be invented.

He was so invested in his thoughts, feeling the warmth from Treble's body, and staring into the gloomy sky, shades of bitter grey mixing into each other in a bleak photograph, he hadn’t noticed the figure walking across a muddy path.

“Bass?”

Those fucking blue eyes, like the sky, should be. He was holding a blue umbrella with white polka dots. Wearing a blue raincoat and blue rain boots with a small yellow duck painted on them.

The first words out of his mouth were, “What the fuck is up with you and blue?”

Rockman blinked. “It’s just sort of my thing, I guess. I like it. It’s um, well, I like that it can be depressing but also hopeful? Does that make sense?”

The words clicked in his head but he just scoffed. “Sure. What are you doing out here?”

“Well, I was looking for Blues, this seems to be the kind of place he would be fond of… But I found you, an unexpected prize!”

‘I’m not a fucking prize to be won, asshole.”

“Well, no. Of course not. Why are you out here?”

“...I don’t know.”

“I’ve been feeling a lot of wanderlust…” Rock sighed. “I think you put that in my head when you linked us up.”

Bass flinched, suddenly feeling hot with shame. “S-shut your mouth… I don’t want to talk about that."

“I haven’t told anyone," Rock said. “They think I’ve been acting weird. I feel weird, but I also feel closer to you.” He chuckled. “It was also raining when we…”

Bass stayed silent.

“Bass… You didn’t scream at me.”

What was he supposed to say to that?

He pulled the raincoat's hood over his head and left his umbrella.

“Get home safe, okay?”

And he left. Bass wondered if he would find Protoman, as he stared at the blue umbrella, rain streaking down its side.

Treble whined at him. 

“I know I should destroy it.” Treble yawned as he stood up, and Bass followed, gripping the umbrella, they could transport back but...

He raised it over his head.


End file.
